


All I Want For Christmas Is You (and cake)

by zjofierose



Series: star, star verse (YOI poly verse) [10]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Character Study, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Cooking, Domestic Fluff, Feeding, Fluff, Hanukkah, Holidays, Kissing, M/M, Nostalgia, Winter Solstice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:14:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28011483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zjofierose/pseuds/zjofierose
Summary: Four days and four boys and four meals in late December.
Relationships: Otabek Altin/Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov/Yuri Plisetsky
Series: star, star verse (YOI poly verse) [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1596319
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15
Collections: The Yuri!!! on Ice Secret Santa - Edition 2020





	All I Want For Christmas Is You (and cake)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CurryJolokia (capra)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/capra/gifts).



> I have attempted to make this as reasonably culturally and culinarily accurate as possible, but if I have included some truly egregious error, please let me know! Also, all of these foods are real and tasty, and I encourage you to track them down and try them yourselves!
> 
> Many thanks to @seventhstar and @warpspeedchic for the handholding.
> 
> ETA: I did not recognize the name of my giftee until I typed it in below and it popped up with (capra) on the end OH SHIT HI CAPRA I HOPE YOU LIKE THIS <3 <3 <3

**December 21st :**

“Hey, Katsudon!” 

“Yes?” Yuuri’s reply from the living room is cautious. “What do you need?”

Yuri blows a wayward strand of blond hair out of his eyes and squints at the pile of grated potato and assorted ingredients in front of him. 

“You know how to fry things, right? Like, food.”

There’s a long and telling pause, followed by the sound of shuffling footsteps. Yuuri’s face appears around the edge of the doorframe. 

“Yes,” he says, voice still cautious. “You’ve seen me fry things many times. Why do you ask?”

Yuri scowls. “I’m supposed to fry these up, but I’ve never done it before and I don't want to burn the house down.”

“Oh.” Yuuri’s already stepping into the kitchen, reaching for his apron and pulling it over his head. He comes to stand next to Yuri and peer down into the glass mixing bowl on the counter. “Ok. Um. What are we making?”

“ _ Latkes _ .” 

Yuuri pokes the pile of shredded potato and onion curiously with a wooden spoon. “What are those?”

“Oh,” Yuri passes him the cast iron frying pan from the oven and watches as Yuuri gets the gas range going. “They’re potato pancakes. You make them for Hanukkah. Dedushka always made them when I was a kid.”

“And you’re supposed to fry them?” Yuuri squints at the recipe Yuri has pulled up on his phone. “In chicken fat and oil. Hm. Okay.” He flicks at the screen, scrolling down to look at the finished product. 

“Yeah. We need to make them into little pancake-things, and then fry them. And then we eat them with sour cream and applesauce.”

Yuuri makes a contemplative face. “Huh. Well, that sounds good. You’re thinking for dinner?”

“Yeah.” Yuri smiles, digging his fingers into the bowl of ingredients and beginning to form a small, round, patty as Yuuri carefully measures oil into the skillet. “Thanks, Katsudon.”

\--

They’re setting the last of the latkes to dry on a rack when Victor and Otabek come through the door, arms full of groceries and trailing cold air. 

“Oooh,” Victor slips off his shoes and coat in record time, sliding into the kitchen to drop the bags of food on the counter and wrap his arms around Yuuri from behind. “Latkes? I love latkes!”

“ _ Tsk _ ,” Yuri smacks his fingers with the wooden spoon as Victor reaches for one, then rolls his eyes and presses a kiss to the same fingers when Victor pouts and holds them up. “Put the groceries away. These aren’t cooled yet, they’re for dinner.”

“Hm,” Otabek wanders in, setting down his armload with considerably more grace and patience than Victor. He kisses Yuri hello, then leans over Yuuri’s shoulder to examine the last two latkes busily frying in the skillet. “Potatoes?”

“Yeah, and onions. And some other stuff. Yura made the...dough? Batter? I just fried them.” Yuuri presses his cheek against Otabek’s briefly. “Set the table?”

Otabek nods, rubbing his chin against Yuri’s shoulder affectionately. “Sure.”

\--

Otabek gets out the nice plates and Victor pours them all a glass of wine. The sour cream and applesauce are on the table, along with a bowl of sauerkraut and an assortment of sliced vegetables. It’s only five pm, but it’s already full dark, and the reflections of the holiday lights hung around the outside of the windows twinkle in the frosted glass panes.

“This is great!” Victor’s smile is broad as they sit down. He stabs a latke with his fork and flips it onto his plate. “I haven’t had latkes since before Yakov and Lilia got divorced! He stopped making them after she and I both moved out, I think.”

“I’m not sure I know Coach Feltsman was religious,” Otabek muses, grabbing his own pair of latkes and coating one with applesauce, one with sour cream.

“Only kind of,” Victor says, waving his fork. “Mmm,  _ vkusno _ ! Well done, my Yuris!”

“Yeah,” Yurio says with a mouthful. “He started making them again when I moved in with him and Lilia. It was nice. He’s a decent cook.”

“These are really good, Yurio.” Yuuri chews thoughtfully. “Can we make them other times? Or is it only allowed for Hanukkah?”

Yuri shrugs, shoving nearly a whole latke in his mouth at once and chewing. “Don’t think it matters,” he manages after swallowing, “and besides. No one here’s going to tell on us if we do.”

“Did he make his matzo ball soup while you lived with him?” Victor asks, and Yuri nods. 

“Yeah,  _ fuck _ . So good. We gotta get that recipe out of him.”

Otabek frowns thoughtfully. “You’re not Jewish, Vitya. Are you?”

“No, no,” Victor shakes his head. “No, my family’s Orthodox, like Lilia’s. But he and Lilia, they both like to cook, and they celebrated all the various holidays with food. So.” He shrugs. “Although…” he lays a finger along his lips and thinks for a moment, then hops up from the table and disappears down the hallway.

“How long did Vitya live with Yakov?” Otabek asks. “He never talks about it.”

“Five years,” Yuuri answers without looking up from his plate. “From just before he turned thirteen to just before he turned eighteen. He moved out shortly before they divorced.”

“I found it!” Victor stands in the mouth of the hallway, brandishing a small brass object. 

“What’s that?” Yuuri asks, and Yuri’s eyes go big. 

“A Hanukkiah! I didn’t know you had one of those!”

“Baba Feltsman gave it to me,” Victor chirps, crossing to the kitchen and rummaging in a drawer. “We’ll need to pick up proper candles tomorrow, but this will do for tonight. Yura, do you remember the prayers to say for lighting?”

Yuri shakes his head. “Not well enough. C’mon, Vitya, it’s supposed to go in the window.” He hops up from the table and grabs the lighter Yuuri keeps near the stove for when the power fails. 

“Here,” Otabek stands and follows them to the window where Victor’s got the little brass candle-holder balanced on the sill and Yuri is adding two small candle stubs, one in the middle and one at the end. “I pulled them up on my phone.”

Yuri takes the lighter as Yuuri joins them, watching curiously as he leans against Otabek. 

“What do you do?” he asks, and Yuri nods at Otabek, who pushes play. 

The soft chant of another tongue rises from the phone, and Yuri flicks the lighter, catching the wick of the middle candle until it takes, then lifting it out of its holder and using it to light the candle on the end. The voice on the phone moves into a second prayer, and Yuri replaces the middle candle, settling it carefully so as not to jostle the other.

The chant changes once again, and they stand there watching the flicker of the tiny flames in the glass of the window until the phone goes silent and Otabek turns it off. 

\--- 

**December 22nd:**

It’s a rare quiet morning at the house. It’s snowed the night before, and the yard is covered in sparkling soft drifts that glisten in the pre-dawn light, as yet unspoiled by dogs or squirrels or the inevitable vagaries of the freeze and melt cycle. 

Yuri had left for the rink at seven, heading out into the pitch-dark with his skates and gear. Yuuri had gone with him, leaving Victor home with a still-sleeping Otabek in the dark and cold of the St. Petersburg winter dawn.

It’s times like this when Victor wonders if this house was too much; too big. He thinks wistfully of his small apartment downtown, then shakes his head at himself and puts some water on to heat in the samovar. It was impractical, all four of them living in two bedrooms and a single public room. Cozy, sure, but as soon as one person started taking too long in the bathroom, everyone elses’s sharp elbows began to appear. 

He lets Makka out, watching in his boots and pajamas and coat as she sniffs around the bushes and selects this morning’s perfect spot. He loves this time of year, for all that it’s normally spent drilling for Nationals and flying around the world for the GPF. Last year it was hard to adjust to the extra time in his schedule, hard not to have the purpose of a looming competition to spur him out of bed in the mornings. This year it just feels calm; peaceful. 

He watches the edge of the sky turn purple, then gold. He thinks he likes it.

\--

Otabek’s up when he goes back inside, nose red and fingers frozen. He kicks off his boots and hangs his coat, padding in his sock-feet over to the kitchen counter. The water’s hot, and Victor adds tea leaves to the pot before filling it from the nozzle and replacing it back on top of the samovar. Otabek watches with a raised eyebrow.

“Feeling nostalgic?” he asks, tipping his head toward the elegant metal boiler on the counter. 

Victor smiles. It’s true, he supposes - he hadn’t really thought about why he got it out instead of going for the kettle that is their usual tea-and-coffee making staple. He shrugs a shoulder.

“I guess, after remembering holidays with Yakov and Lilia.”

Otabek just nods and gets down two mugs, setting them beside the samovar and the small china dish of jam. 

“My grandmother always kept a samovar,” Otabek says thoughtfully. “I’m not sure how she got it. There are no ethnic Russians on either side of my family. But it was always on the table at meals.”

Victor gets down two bowls. “What did it look like?” 

“Hm.” Otabek leans against the counter, his sweatpants riding low on his flat abs and exposing the arrow of dark hair that angles down his stomach and below his waistline. Victor has to pause and kiss him for a long moment before he can continue. “It was copper, I think. Painted with blue and white flowers. Antique, of course, not electric.”

“Lilia still has her grandmother’s samovar.” Victor brings a pan of water to a boil, then adds wheat and raisins. “It came out for every holiday and also on Sundays.”

“Is it exactly as fancy as you’d expect?”

“No,” Victor chuckles. “Actually not. It’s small and brass and pretty banged up. But she puts it right out on the lace tablecloth with the china tea cups like it was used by Ekaterina herself.”

Otabek loops an arm around his waist and leans his head sleepily on Victor’s shoulder as Victor adds nuts and poppy seeds to the porridge and stirs.

“What are you making?” Otabek’s warm, always, and Victor closes his eyes for a second to appreciate the heat of him pressed up against Victor’s side. It’s a blessing he never expected, this quiet thing he has with Otabek. 

“ _ Kutya _ . It’s usually made specifically for Christmas, but,” Victor shrugs. “Talking about the holidays at Yakov’s and Lilia’s last night reminded me how much I like it.”

“Hmm.” Otabek steps back and watches as Victor takes it off the heat and stirs in a generous dollop of honey and a sprinkling of poppy seeds. “We make similar things at home, but not for Christmas.”

Victor spoons the mixture into two bowls, setting them aside to cool as he gets down the teapot and pours thick, black tea into the bottom of each cup. He replaces the pot and adds water from the spigot at the base of the samovar to the cups, careful not to slosh. 

“Lilia always liked to do the full, big, Orthodox Christmas dinner,” he says, pushing a bowl and a cup toward Otabek who takes them with a small smile, his dark hair adorably rumpled. “All the courses, and all the ceremony. The  _ olivier _ , the  _ vinaigrette _ . The deviled eggs and the fish, the  _ piroshki _ and the  _ coulibiac _ .” Victor sighs fondly. “I’d go back to the ice five kilos heavier after Christmas.”

Otabek takes a bite of his porridge and hums appreciatively. “This is nice.”

“Thanks! It’s meant to be symbolic, of course, like all the Christmas food. But I just like it! Oh, but here,” he scoops up a spoonful from his bowl. “It’s supposed to be served all in one dish, for unity, so.” He holds the spoon out, and Otabek takes it in his mouth, pulling back to leave the spoon clean. “There. That probably counts.”

He sets his bowl to the side and reaches out to pull Otabek closer. 

Otabek’s mouth, when Victor kisses him, is warm and tastes like honey.

\--

**December 23rd**

“Oh,” Yuuri blinks as he steps into the kitchen. “Are you cooking tonight, Ota-kun? I thought it was my turn.”

Otabek continues methodically slicing the carrots in front of him. “I thought I’d make some Kazakh food for dinner.”

“Oh.” Yuuri steps closer, examining the set-up. Rice is boiling away in a pot, and there’s a glass mixing bowl of dough at his elbow. “Why?”

“Vitya and Yura made me think of it.” Otabek rolls his shoulders and places the knife by the sink, reaching over to stir the rice before lowering the heat. “Talking about the holiday dinners.”

“Do you have Christmas dinners in Kazakhstan?” Yuuri asks, hopping up on the counter out of the way. “I thought most people were Muslim?”

“They are.” Otabek pulls out the cumin and a couple of beef sausages, retrieving the knife and rinsing it before slicing the sausages with easy expertise. “Some families are Orthodox; one of my friends growing up was. His family always did a big dinner. But mostly we celebrate New Year’s.”

Yuuri squints. “So this isn’t holiday food.”

“No,” Otabek agrees, “not specifically. Just food I missed from home. You remember  _ plov _ , from when you came last time?”

Yuuri nods eagerly. “Yeah! I really liked it. Is that what you’re making?”

“Yeah, and some  _ baursak _ .” He gestures at the dough. 

“Ooh,” Yuuri’s eyes sparkle. “What’s that? Can I take a picture and send it to  _ okaasan _ ?”

Otabek smiles. “If you want. It’ll look better once I fry it up. They’re like,” he thinks for a minute. “Like flat donuts, I guess? Deep-fried sweet dough.”

“Can I help?” 

“Sure,” Otabek reaches over and fishes Yuuri’s favorite apron off the peg by the door and holds it out. Yuuri hops down and takes it, tying it efficiently behind himself. “Why don’t you roll out the dough and cut it?”

“How thick? What shapes?”

“Mm, one to two centimeters. And it doesn’t matter. My family usually does triangles.”

“Okay!” Yuuri lightly flours the counter and dumps the dough out, placing the bowl in the sink and digging the rolling pin out of a drawer. “What’s Kazakh food like in the winter? I mostly remember lots of vegetables and rice and grilled meats, but that was spring and summer and also we were eating in restaurants a lot.”

Otabek thinks. “Still a lot of meat,” he says after a bit, turning the rice into another mixing bowl and fluffing it as he adds cumin. He gets out a skillet and adds some oil, then begins to lightly fry the sausage and carrots. “Nomadic people, you know. Meat and dairy, because that’s what’s around. But also preserved fruits, and eggs, and bread-type-things like  _ baursak _ . Root vegetables.”

Yuuri nods, grabbing a sharp knife and beginning to slice the now-flattened dough into even triangles. “That’s kind of like Japan. We do more seafood, of course- fish and seaweed is common in so much. But lots of meat and broth and stews. You’ve had ramen, but there’s also  _ oden _ or  _ nikuman _ .” Yuuri’s face is flushed both at the thought of the foods and from the heat of the stove, and Otabek smiles as he watches Yuuri from the stove. He deposits the now-cooked carrots and the fried sausage into the plov and stirs it up, making a fragrant aroma arise before he covers it with a dish-towel to keep it warm. 

Otabek pours a little more oil in the skillet and turns up the heat while Yuuri rummages in the cabinets for a drying rack and sets it on the counter. He pulls out a sheet of parchment paper and places it beneath the rack, then steps back to watch as Otabek begins to fry the  _ baursak _ . 

It’s not long before the  _ baursak _ are done and steaming from the rack, golden brown and smelling of sugar. Otabek regards them with a critical eye and decides they’ll do, then pulls the towel off the plov and stirs it with a wooden spoon.

“ _ Okasaan _ always called carrots cut like that ‘suns’,” Yuuri says, fondness in his voice, and Otabek chuckles.

“Well, it is the solstice,” he answers, pulling out a jar of honey. He arranges the still-hot baursak on one of Victor’s fancy china plates and drizzles them with honey. “So I guess that’s appropriate.”

“It is? I didn’t know.” 

There are still two  _ baursak _ left on the rack, the most misshapen of the bunch. Otabek picks one up and swirls it in the lid of the honey jar, coating it with liquid gold. 

“I never paid much attention, but when I lived in Canada, my roommate cared about solar holidays. So now I notice them.” Otabek lifts the honeyed pastry to Yuuri’s lips, and Yuuri obediently opens his mouth and lets Otabek pop it in. It’s almost too big, and his tongue catches on the pads of Otabek’s fingers as he licks at his lips to catch the crumbs. “May the coming year be full of light.”

The moan Yuuri makes is obscene, his eyelids fluttering closed, and Otabek has to shift his stance to get a little more room in the front of his jeans. The way Victor and Yuuri both are about food,  _ honestly _ . Still, he doesn’t pull his eyes from Yuuri’s face as he chews, cheeks flushing and smile curving around his mobile mouth. 

“Good?” Otabek asks when Yuuri’s eyes open again, and Yuuri nods, making this little contented noise as his tongue flicks at the corner of his mouth.

“ _ Vkusno _ ,” Yuuri says with a laugh, and Otabek steps into his space, lifting his chin to catch Yuuri’s mouth with his own. 

Yuuri tastes of sugar, sweet and sticky, and Otabek chases the taste of him down.

\--

**December 24th**

“Yuuuuriii,” Victor whines, leaning around the kitchen doorway, “are you really going to be in the kitchen all day?” 

“Vitya, for fuck’s sake!” Yuri appears behind him and smacks him lightly on the back of the head. “It’s your turn. Leave Katsudon alone and get back in here, or Beka and I are going to consider your properties forfeit.”

“So  _ mean _ to me,” Victor whines, but lets himself be dragged into the other room without further protest. The last thing Yuuri sees is Yura’s disappearing thumbs-up from the doorway.

It’s good. Yuuri is grateful. He is up to his elbows in flour, has his mother on video for advice, the anxiety sweat of trying to get this right is soaking through his undershirt, and Victor is only ever a (delightful) distraction.

But this isn’t about Victor, or at least not entirely. This is about all of them, and about Yuuri wanting to show all of them what Christmas is in Japan, and what they mean to him, and how much he treasures their relationship and how happy he is in their new home and-

“Yuuri, breathe,” his mother says over the skippy connection. “You can do this. I promise I will talk you through it.”

\--

He starts early in the morning, melting the butter and beating the eggs. He’s never made a sponge cake before, but his mom talks him through adding the various ingredients slowly, and baking it for the right length of time. He sweats his way through cutting it in half, but it’s only slightly lopsided, and you won’t be able to tell once it’s put back together anyway. 

The sponge goes in the fridge to cool.  _ You can do this _ , his mother says, making her own cake on her end in solidarity.  _ You can do this. _

Victor thinks it’s a birthday cake, and Yuuri hasn’t disabused him of the notion. It kind of is, in a way. Otabek knows something’s up, because he always does a better job of understanding all of them than any of the rest, but he’s been content to let Yuuri stress it out on his own without pushing for info. 

It’s Yurio who took one look at the strawberries and heavy cream and had his eyes grow big and his cheeks pink with surprise. “Christmas Cake?” he’d asked, and Yuuri, surprised, had nodded and let Yurio step forward to hug him and press a kiss to his cheek. 

In retrospect, he should have figured it out - Yuuko and Yurio are thick as thieves even now, and Yuuko makes a Christmas Cake every year for Nishigori. They get a babysitter for the kids and go out on the town for the night, then come home and eat the cake together. Yuuri wishes he didn’t know that Yuuko always makes extra whipped cream, but there’s no unlearning the details of your friends’ sex lives, unfortunately.

Regardless, it’s useful to have Yurio running interference as Yuuri whips the heavy cream into soft peaks and makes the syrup, coating the bottom sponge first with the sweetened glaze and then with the soft cream. 

He places the sliced strawberries carefully, making sure to leave a small space in the middle for ease of slicing, then covers them over with another layer of cream. It’s like snowfall, he thinks fancifully, like how the wind blows the snow across the yard, hiding Makka’s tracks and Victor’s snow angels in a pristine white canvas.

The second half of the sponge is added, and nearly slips out of his hands. Disaster is averted, but Yuuri has to sit for a moment on the kitchen floor and breathe slowly before his hands stop shaking enough that he can spread the remainder of the cream across the top and sides of his creation.

\--

He’s not sure what possessed him to take this on. He’s an adequate cook, but he’s never been a baker, never  _ wanted _ to be a baker. This is his third holiday season in Russia, and he’s never particularly missed the Japanese Christmas customs or the American obsession with the holiday from his time in Detroit. 

But somehow seeing the joy on Yurio and Victor’s faces over the latkes, seeing Otabek light up as he fried his  _ baursak _ , even getting a christmas tree for their first ever shared home… it pulled something deep within him.

Seeing the strawberries at the grocery store was just sheer serendipity.

\--

He’s not good with words. He never has been, doesn’t particularly expect he ever will be. Somehow, with these people, with this relationship - it doesn’t matter. 

He thinks of Yurio as he prepares the sponge - of his desire to be always present, his determination to be loved. Of how he takes care of them all in his own rough way, of how he lights up the whole room when he laughs, how his face goes still and wondering when something catches him off guard. Of his cold feet and his pointy elbows and how he likes to sleep in the middle of them all, arms around whomever he can reach and legs tangled with another. 

Beka is for the whipped cream; his quiet devotion to everything he does and the firm self-assurance that underlies every action he takes. He’s fierce and unwavering, and Yuuri holds in his heart Otabek’s solid strength and his sneaky sense of humor, his utter lack of subtlety in his desires and his ability to rise to any challenge and meet it head on, as he spreads the whipped cream around and around, smoothing it as best he can until it’s as carefully flat as any rink.

Vitya...Vitya is for the end, and Yuuri slices the strawberries as evenly as possible before piping dollops of cream evenly around the top edge of the cake. The strawberry halves form a perfect red ring against the soft white of the cream, and Yuuri thinks of Victor in the onsen that very first morning with the snow on the ground in drifts as white as the cream on this cake. Vitya, who has been with him now so long it seems almost like the time before him was just a dream, and that the reality is that Yuuri and Victor were always there for each other, always reaching out, always stretching to find each other. 

He puts the cake in the fridge to set and wipes his eyes. 

The game in the other room is not yet finished, but there’s a spot on the couch for him at Victor’s side, and no one mentions if he cuddles in close and hides his face in Victor’s neck.

\--

It’s not a day that matters in Russia, the 24th, but they light the menorah at 4 pm when the sun goes down, let it burn while they get ready, and then head out into the streets to hit up the Christmas market and take in some street music. 

There’s a festive atmosphere, people bustling to and fro, music playing and the smells of cooking food wafting through the air. Yuuri buys a decoration for their tree and Yuri finds a pair of leopard print mittens, but mostly they spend the time arm in arm with each other, people-watching and enjoying the sights and sounds of the city. After a while they find a food stall selling kebabs and grab some food, but they don’t linger too long before returning home to walk Makka and warm up. 

Yuuri waits till they’re all settled before he goes to the fridge and retrieves the cake. He’s kept a knife chilling alongside it for cutting, and he brings them both out to the counter while Victor makes them all hot chocolate. 

The cake has held up well, in spite of Yuuri’s fears, and he manages to not drop it as he carries it to the table, going back to retrieve the knife and then finding himself standing in front of them all with no idea what he wants to say.

“Christmas Eve in Japan is a holiday for lovers,” Yurio states, then promptly blushes, but it gives Yuuri the opening he needs. He smiles gratefully. 

“Yes. Traditionally people in relationships celebrate together on Christmas Eve, and then families on Christmas Day. So, I made a Christmas cake…” he trails off.

“It’s beautiful,  _ zolotse _ ,” Victor says, and his smile rounds at the corners while his eyes squint close in delight. “What skill!"

“My, um,” Yuuri stammers, “ _ Okaasan _ helped me.”

“Would you like me to cut it?” Otabek offers gently, and Yuuri realizes his hands are trembling. 

“Yes. Thank you, Beka. I just-” he clenches his hands in frustration as Otabek carves perfectly even slices onto plates, setting the first in front of Victor. “I’m just so happy that we’re all together,” he bursts out, “and that we’re here, and we have this house, and Makka, and Potya, and maybe we’ll get another dog-”

“Or cat,” Yuri puts in.

“Or cat, and I just want to keep celebrating more holidays with all of you, so please eat this cake and want that, too!”

He sits abruptly, trying not to look at the faces around the table, but a hand touches his own and he raises his head.

Yuri’s face is doing that complicated thing where it flickers between simple happiness and a more wary protective stare, but his hand is warm and firm on Yuuri’s. Otabek is smiling softly, his dark eyes fond. He lifts a bite of cake with his fork and salutes Yuuri with it, and Yuuri feels his cheeks heat in response. And Victor… Victor is beaming to rival the sun, mouth already full and free hand wound into Yuuri’s own. 

“Oh!!” Yuuri says suddenly, remembering. “And happy birthday, Victor!!”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
